33 Responses to “Dems Hear Dog Whistles”

Yesterday, on Best of the Web (about the Romney “birther” dog whistle, James Taranto wrote:

The thing we adore about these dog-whistle kerfuffles is that the people who react to the whistle always assume it’s intended for somebody else. The whole point of the metaphor is that if you can hear the whistle, you’re the dog.

Yet he actually ciotes such a dog whistle:

In his 2004 speech accepting the Democratic presidential nomination, John Kerry* asserted: “Let’s never misuse for political purposes the most precious document in American history, the Constitution of the United States.” A platitude to the ordinary ear was an endorsement of same-sex marriage at 30 kilohertz.

* The haughty, French-looking Massachusetts Democrat, who by the way served in Vietnam.

In Oregon, the only prepared food you can buy with food stamps is Take-n-Bake pizzas. I always thought they should run food stamps like WIC: here’s a list of food you’re allowed to get, the size, and the quantity.

With regard to Biden’s dog whistle comment, at least Charlie Rangel was bold enough to call him out on it. Some people hear the dog whistle because it actually is what is being denied.
“The Vice President said he’s going to put “y’all in chains,’” Mr. Rangel told The Perez Notes in a recent free-wheeling interview. “Was he talking about slavery? You bet your ass he was. Was he using the vernacular? Yes, he was. Did he think it was cute? Yes, he did. Was it something stupid to say? You bet your life it was stupid.”

“It was something that if a black had said it, we would have been laughing, because we would know deep down, they may be beating the hell out of us but they ain’t thinking about putting us into any chains,” he added.

Yes, Kevin, that is exactly what I expect. Especially when our First Lady is preaching her drivel about eating right, and we hear so much about the poor being overweight. How are you overweight if you don’t get enough to eat because you are poor?

Add to the fact that children on free lunch in schools come from a majority of families that receive food stamps, which means they get food stamps based upon a size of the family, then the children eat a third of their meals away from home, so we are paying for food twice.

That’s not so good. Cash is still needed for some things, particularly fruit, and things bought in many 99 cent stores. And rent and utility bills, where even if they would be accepted, there’s a surcharge.

And can you pay a credit card bill with an EBT card? Or tip someone.

Unless they get the whole card. A part time or maybe volunteer Rabbi (NCSY-Dallas) wrote in the Jewish Press this week that he bought a $50 Chick-Fil-A gift card to give as a tip to his postal carrier (are we allowed to?) because of this controversy and because he likes what he stands for, even though his family is in the meat business (he’s CEO of AD Rosenblatt Kosher Meats, founded by his great grandfather in Galveston Texas in 1910, that would be nine or ten years after the hurricane) he had a problem with this company because they have these billboards of good looking cows imploring people to eat chicken instead of beef – implying that it is more humane to eat chicken than beef. And on top of that, the cows in the picture are Holsteins which are used for milk and not meat!

Yes, Kevin, that is exactly what I expect. Especially when our First Lady is preaching her drivel about eating right, and we hear so much about the poor being overweight. How are you overweight if you don’t get enough to eat because you are poor?

Because pasta is really cheap, unlike fish and meat and fruit. At least if you buy fruit in a supermarket.

And you could add milk, except it is often government policy to drive up the price.

Add to the fact that children on free lunch in schools come from a majority of families that receive food stamps, which means they get food stamps based upon a size of the family, then the children eat a third of their meals away from home, so we are paying for food twice.

Food stamps are now basically supplemental income, because unlike the way it was at first, no cash is needed to by food stamps.

Originally , let’s say a family food budget was calculated at $114 – a person paid X number of Dollars to get the $114 worth of food stamps. Now they just get the difference. This changed rather early on, in the 1970s – after all it was requiring poor people to come up with money up front.

Food stamps were replaced with debit cards (usually doubling as a Medicaid card) sometime after the year 2000.

The Obama campaign is saying that what the Ryan plan really would destroy is not so much Medicare as Medicaid. Of course that’s being destroyed all along or a good number of years (by low reimbursements, compared to other payers)